when a natural father gives his son in adoption to another
person, the son's rights shall remain the same in every particular as
if he had continued in the power of his natural father, and the adoption
had never taken place, except only that he shall be able to succeed his
adoptive father should he die intestate. If, however, the latter makes
a will, the son cannot obtain any part of the inheritance either by the
civil or by the praetorian law, that is to say, either by impeaching the
will as unduteous or by applying for possession against the will; for,
being related by no tie of blood, the adoptive father is not bound
either to institute him heir or to disinherit him, even though he has
been adopted, in accordance with the SC. Afinianum, from among three
brothers; for, even under these circumstances, he is not entitled to a
fourth of what he might have taken on intestacy, nor has he any action
for its recovery. We have, however, by our constitution excepted persons
adopted by natural ascendants, for between them and their adopters there
is the natural tie of blood as well as the civil tie of adoption, and
therefore in this case we have preserved the older law, as also in that
of an independent person giving himself in adrogation: all of which
enactment can be gathered in its special details from the tenor of the
aforesaid constitution.

15 By the ancient law too, which favoured the descent through males,
those grandchildren only were called as family heirs, and preferred to
agnates, who were related to the grandfather in this way: grandchildren
by daughters, and greatgrandchildren by granddaughters, whom it regarded
only as cognates, being called after the agnates in succession to
their maternal grandfather or greatgrandfather, or their grandmother or
greatgrandmother, whether paternal or maternal. But the Emperors would
not allow so unnatural a wrong to endure without sufficient correction,
and accordingly, as people are, and are called, grandchildren and
greatgrandchildren of a person whether they trace their descent through
males or through females, they placed them altogether in the same rank
and order of succession. In order, however, to bestow some privilege on
those who had in their favour the provisions of the ancient law as
well as natural right, they determined that grandchildren,
greatgrandchildren, and others who traced their descent through a female
should have their portion of the inheritance diminished b